though the stars walk backward
by fluggerbutter
Summary: In your lungs a fracture that air keeps flowing out of so you never get enough, upon your heart a cut that burns every time it beats. And you loved others but never stopped loving her.


You loved her. Sweet, softspoken, gentle, with blue eyes that glittered in the moonlight like stars to match; you sought her out, her breathless laugh, her dainty feet, her dancing feather-light—gloves just barely grazing your skin as she almost kissed you / didn't kiss you. You searched the kingdom. You found her. You loved her. You tried. You could not stop remembering the sight of her as she fled from the ball the first night, hiking up the hem of her too-white dress: the way her hair streaked behind her as she flew down the steps, the desperation in your voice as your words fell on deaf, sorry ears. The difference was you found her. And if you found her, _well,_ there were other things lost that had yet to be regained—

You loved her. The girl who sang with the lilt of a nightingale in the daytime. Her hair cascaded in a crimson river to meet your fingers and the glare of the sun on each strand was blinding. You sat and watched her fingers flutter as she spoke of the wonders of the world she had yet to see. So full of hope. So unpunished by heartbreak. You listened and wondered at every molten-gold word that poured from her lips, and fell asleep awash in nightingale song. One day you leaned forward and kissed her and it wasn't the same but you kissed her, and hefted her up and let her arms wrap around you as you carried her down to earth, in spite of the risk or because of it, because you loved her but you wouldn't mind if the old witch arrived and gouged out your eyes and tossed you in the river, because it was what you deserved, because as much as you loved her your heart still rested in the hands of a woman who wanted nothing more than to throw it away.

You loved her. Soft curls and brown skin that was sun-kissed and browner still because of years spent running barefoot through dappled-light woods. Her smile was white, white, fairy-blessed bright and open and real and so precious to you; this, remember, this moment, that honest laugh and the crinkle of her hazel-sun-star eyes, the curl of her fingers resting in the grass as you lay by her side _vividly_ , remember this. The loss you felt when the thorns began to eclipse the sun / your sun / the death-sleep she lay in, dark curls still splayed out perfect beneath her head. Your shaky, strangled cry repressed, you stared at her maybe too long, thought maybe too far back, to the days of crystal coffins shattered and a red mouth chastely caught in yours. You kissed her and she woke, because truly, truly you loved her, and it's not enough replacement for this numb, dead thing inside you but you have the dragon heart to prove it, still run through with your sword.

You loved her. A girl who fell trusting into the arms of seven strangers. Child enough to nurse naïveté you had yet to dispel yourself, she did not know what it was like to be unkind and trusted wholly. Blatantly, lovingly, she put her faith in you, a man lost but for the moment you found her. Soft and brilliant, painted porcelain, she stole your breath in more ways than one; an innocent thief who plucked this kiss from your lips as she slept there, still, death immortalized. Her eyes when they opened were the fierce blue of summer. But they the crisper, colder, like the sky in December on the day she wore white, when she caught your gaze and held it, and you saw an apology there but could not understand why until she was running and your hand was grasping empty air. And you loved her. And you love her. And you are still waiting shell-shocked, heart breaking like glass in your own bloody ears, in a daze, missing, torn. Uncomprehending and empty, suddenly, in your lungs a fracture that air keeps flowing out of so you never get enough, upon your heart a cut that burns every time it beats. And you loved others but never stopped loving her, never stopped feeling a persistent, gaping hole you now only blearily remember ever having been filled; even now, as she turns away, as you see the back of her head for the hundredth time, as you resign yourself to the fact that this is all you'll ever see of her. With her, without her, you love her; you did, you do, you will until your immortal body has proved itself fallible after all.

And to do so kills you, but it won't kill you. And so it goes.


End file.
